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Boston sets memorial for victims of marathon bombing

BOSTON MARATHON: Photos from left, Martin Richard, 8, Lingzi Lu, a Boston University graduate student, and Krystle Campbell, 29, hang at a makeshift memorial near the finish line of the Boston Marathon explosions, which killed three and injured more than 140. Photo: Associated Press/Matt Rourke

(BOSTON) Reuters – Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, and some of the 264 people injured in the April 15 Boston Marathon bombing will attend a memorial service on the one-year anniversary of the attack, officials said on Thursday.

Officials offered few details of the event, which will be held at Boston’s Hynes Convention Center and will also feature remarks from first responders and a tribute to the three people killed by the twin homemade pressure-cooker bombs.

“We were put to the ultimate test by the events at last year’s Boston Marathon,” Patrick said. “We rose to the occasion: turning to each other, rather than against and showing the world what a strong community looks like.”

The blasts, which ripped through spectators, volunteers and athletes at the crowded finish line of Boston’s best-attended sporting event, prompted a week-long security flurry across the city, culminating in a day-long lockdown of the greater metropolitan area as police conducted a manhunt for suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

Tsarnaev, a 20-year-old immigrant from Russia’s restive Chechnya region, was arrested late on April 19, after he and his 26-year-old brother, Tamerlan, shot and killed a university police officer in a hasty attempt to escape the city, authorities said.

On Wednesday, a U.S. judge ruled that the surviving Tsarnaev’s trial on charges related to the attack will begin in November. The suspect, who lived just outside Boston for the decade prior to the bombing, faces the possibility of execution if he is convicted.